NATURE WALK

   ollie was not too fond of our animal friends.

this is how he stayed for a lot of the mile long hike!

sofia loved feeding the animals

ollie finally got comfortable

my cute little kids in front of the yellow river.

some of the moms from church have put together a play group and today's outing was to the yellow river game ranch. we had so much fun, but ollie took a little while to get used to the animals being so up close and personal. sofia had no problem getting along with the animals and had a great time hanging out with her church buddies!

WEEKEND ROAD TRIP

last weekend we took the kids (not jakob, he stayed home sick with justin) to our land up north. we took the four wheelers, and the guns for a little family time. we had a great time and the kids LOVED being outside all day. the weather couldn't have been better. sofia was rob's helper by pulling the clay pigeons while he shot them. nico drove annelies around on the four wheeler most of the time and me and ollie drove the mule around. we had a great time!

FOLLOW THE YELLOW BRICK ROAD

our halloween night was a lot of fun. rob's parents came up from peachtree city and after a really yummy bbq that rob made, we got the kids dressed up and headed out to gather up more candy. the kids had so much fun and the weather was perfect. it was just a little cool and not hot at all. we are very used to trick or treating in the heat. ollie took a little while to warm up to the trick or treating concept, but once he got going, he was running to the door to get more candy. 

Once home, we dumped out all the candy, let the kids eat until their stomach's ached and put in the movie monster house. the kids settled into the couch with their popcorn and enjoyed a nice movie night with the family!

TRUNK OR TREAT

i don't know why, but the pictures are downloading backwards to how i installed them. they are supposed to start from the bottom picture and end with the top, but oh well... you get the picture!

well it's that time of year again when there is a chill in the air, chili is made, the hot dogs are thrown on the grill and the kids get to dress up in there favorite costumes. trunk or treating is always a fun night and the kids of course love the games, friends, and CANDY! rob and i had fun this year coming up with a theme for halloween. not all of the kids were too thrilled about our selected costumes, but the pictures are awesome and the memories will be great! 

OUR PUMPKINS

it is tradition for us to carve our pumpkins with my sister every year.... apparently! nico made sure to make it a tradition anyways, i guess we never realized it, but we do seem to do this every year. so on friday my sister and Beckham came over and when the kids came home from school i let them choose a pattern and i carved it. you can't see it, but annelies' pumpkin has hearts for ears! 

PUMPKIN PICKIN'

the kids had a day off of school for a teacher work day a few weeks ago, so rob and i decided to take advantage of some much needed family time. we looked for a pumpkin patch, but ended up at a large georgia grown vegetable stand that had LOTS of pumpkins to choose from. it was nice because i could do some grocery shopping and get our pumpkins in one stop. we did end up getting some cute pictures of the kids after we picked our cute pumpkins.

MONSTERS IN HER HEAD

Oh what an imagination my Sofia has. She loves to play outside and even when nobody is out there to play with her, she will go and rock herself on the swing. So today as she was swinging i heard her running back to the house with a terrified cry and this is how our conversation went as i rushed to get to her....

me: "sofia, sofia, what happened, what's wrong?"

sofia: "there's an animal"

me: "oh, no. how big?"

sofia: "this big" (as she stands as tall as she can and reaches way over her head. still crying and shaking and terrified)

me: "wow. that is really big. it's okay, why don't you go inside and i will go find the big animal"

so after checking out our apparent jungle in our back yard, i return to sofia and question her some more.

me: " sofia, what did the big animal look like?"

sofia: " well it was purple, and it came from over there and then it jumped in the water."

so beware of any big, purple monsters in YOUR back yard!!